me, which I still entertain, that this trial may very possibly lead to a speedy termination of the Peel Ministry.” Not only was this anticipation falsified, but the Government gained in strength from its virtual triumph over O’Connell. Measures of a really beneficial character to Ireland were passed about this period, and for a time the disaffection of the country underwent considerable abatement.
In the early part of 1844, a great affliction fell upon Prince Albert. His father died on the 29th of January, and, although such an event had been anticipated for some time past, the shock was none the less on that account. The grief of the Queen was almost equal to the Prince’s own, and a deep gloom settled down upon the Royal circle. On the 4th of February, Prince Albert wrote to Baron Stockmar:—“God will give us all strength to bear the blow becomingly. That we were separated gives it a peculiar poignancy. Not to see him, not to be present to close his eyes, not to help to comfort those he leaves behind, and to be comforted by them, is very hard. Here we sit together, poor Mamma, Victorie, and myself, and weep, with a great, cold public around us, insensible as stone. To have some true, sympathetic friend at hand would be a great solace. Come to us in this time of trouble, if come you can.... The world is assuredly not our true happiness; and, alas! every day’s experience forces me to see how wicked men are. Every imaginable calumny is heaped upon us, especially upon me; and although a pure nature, conscious of its own high purposes, is and ought to be lifted above attacks, still it is painful to be misrepresented by people of whom one believed better things.” On the 28th of March, the Prince left England for his father’s small dominions, in order to assist his brother Ernest in commencing his duties as the reigning Duke. It was the first time that he and the Queen had ever been parted since their marriage, and both felt the separation acutely. Two days before the Prince’s departure, the Queen of the Belgians reached Buckingham Palace, to spend a brief time with the English sovereign during the period of her solitude; and King Leopold himself arrived a few days later. On the 11th of April, the Prince was back again at Windsor. He records in his diary that he arrived at six o’clock in the evening, in the midst of “great joy.”
The Queen’s birthday was approaching even before the Prince left England; and the latter had already given orders for the preparation of two gifts to her Majesty, which he knew would be very acceptable. On the 5th of March, Prince Albert asked Mr. Eastlake, the painter, if he could execute by the 24th of May a little picture of angels, such as he had introduced into his fresco in the pavilion of Buckingham Palace Gardens. He promised to do the picture by the time mentioned, although he was already at work on one for her Majesty. The other present was a miniature portrait of the Prince himself, by Thorburn, taken in armour, in accordance with a wish frequently expressed by the Queen. The portrait is a full-length, and is said by her Majesty to give the Prince’s real expression more than anything that she knew. “During the fatal illness, and on the last morning of his life,” she writes on the 20th of December, 1873, “he was wonderfully like this picture.” The lower part of the face was done in half an hour, and the whole character and aspect are extremely noble. The two pictures were presented to the Queen on her birthday, at Claremont, where the Royal couple were staying.
The King of Saxony was at this time expected at Buckingham Palace, and he arrived there on the 1st of June. Only two days before, her Majesty and the Prince had been somewhat surprised at hearing that the Emperor of Russia was on his way to visit the English Court, and that he might be looked for at almost any moment. He reached London on the night of June 1st, and remained until the following morning at the Russian Embassy. Next day, he was brought by Prince Albert to Buckingham Palace, where he became the guest of her Majesty, though he again went to the Embassy at night, having resolved for the present not to occupy the apartments prepared for him at the Palace. On the 3rd of June, he was escorted by Prince Albert from the Slough Station to Windsor Castle, whither the Court had now removed.
The habits of this Northern potentate were in some respects remarkably simple and austere. All through his life, he slept on a leathern sack, stuffed with hay or straw. The sack thus filled was stretched upon a camp-bed, and the Emperor never intermitted this custom, even when on a visit to foreign Courts. He produced a very marked impression on the Queen and Prince Albert, and the former, writing to her uncle, the King of the Belgians, on the 4th of June, observes of the Emperor:—“He is certainly a very striking man, still very handsome; his profile is beautiful, and his manners most dignified and graceful; extremely civil, quite alarmingly so, as he is so full of attention and politesse. But the expression of the eyes is severe, and unlike anything I ever saw before. He gives Albert and myself the impression of a man who is not happy, and on whom the burden of his immense power and position weighs heavily and painfully. He seldom smiles, and, when he does, the expression is not a happy one. He is very easy to get on with.” Lady Lyttelton says in one of her letters:—“The only fault in his face is that he has pale eyelashes, and his enormous and very brilliant eyes have no shade; besides which, they have the awful look given by occasional glimpses of white above the eyeball, which comes from his father Paul, I suppose, and gives a savage wildness, for a moment, pretty often.”
He and the King of Saxony were delighted with Windsor, and the Emperor said that the English Court was conducted on the noblest scale of any Court he had ever seen, everything being done without effort, and as if it were the ordinary condition of affairs. The Autocrat of the Russias abounded in gallant speeches to the British sovereign, and pleased her much by his high praises of Prince Albert. Her Majesty was at first a good deal opposed to the visit, seeming to entertain some vague feelings of apprehension on political grounds; but, after a few days, she conceived a sentiment of friendship for him, and in writing to King Leopold expressed her conviction that he was truthful and sincere. She did not regard him as very clever, and she saw that his mind was far from cultivated. The arts, which were so dear to her own husband, he regarded with entire want of interest, and confined his attention solely to politics and military affairs. He showed much alarm about the condition of the East, and professed the greatest anxiety to be on good terms with this country. Speaking of sovereign rulers to her Majesty, he made use of an expression which was very remarkable as coming from him; being to the effect that in modern times all princes should strive to make themselves worthy of their position, so as to reconcile people to the fact of their being princes. This does not seem much in accordance with the ideas or practices of the Czar Nicholas; but his discernment may have taught him what his position, his passions, or his habits, did not allow him to carry out.
The Russian Emperor and the King of Saxony attended Ascot Races on the 4th of June, and witnessed a review in Windsor Park on the 5th. Every evening, a great dinner was served in the Waterloo Room at Windsor Castle.
THE EMPEROR NICHOLAS.
Visits were likewise paid to the seat of the Duke of Devonshire, at Chiswick, and to the Opera; and the Emperor seems to have been really much pleased by his reception. There can be no doubt that he had a political object in coming to England. Turkey was engaging much of his attention, as it had done in earlier years, and he was deeply desirous of carrying out the traditional policy of Russia, as it had been formulated from the days of Peter the Great. He saw that Turkey was in an impoverished and weakened state, partly in consequence of his own acts, and those of his predecessors; and he thought the time had come when some approach should be made towards an understanding with England as to what should be done with the Sultan’s inheritance when he could no longer hold it for himself. With this view, he talked a good deal with Prince Albert, Sir Robert Peel, and Lord Aberdeen. His desire to propitiate the good opinion of the English Government and people was most evident; but the events of later years showed but too plainly with what objects he pursued these conciliatory efforts. The cordial relations which had long existed between England and France were viewed by Nicholas with great distrust and jealousy; for he feared—what, in fact, afterwards occurred—that the two Powers might combine to restrain his ambition in the East. He wished to break up the good feeling between England and France, but met with no encouragement in this respect from Sir Robert Peel. He said that he did not covet an inch of Turkish soil for himself, but that he would not allow anybody else to have one. This, of course, was spoken with reference to France, who had undoubtedly, a few years before, shown a disposition to establish herself in Syria and Egypt. Sir Robert Peel replied by answering that